which is the best e-commerce engine to use?

[caitlyndania]

Hello everybody,

I`ve been away for some time, but I`m back now!

I have question to ask you all. I need help in making a decision.

So, I decide to get into this kind of online business, and I decided to make an e-shop for selling mountain gear, like skis, snowboards, clothes and stuff like that. Now, the problem is that I need to chose the best e-shop engine right ?
Basically, what I`m interested in when making this choice would be as follows:
- I need the best one on SEO of course. From your experience, as I beleive some of you used more that one e-shop software, which one is the best on SEO ? like short loading time, combining css files, and js files... meta tags and everything...
- I need ease of use of course... but I also need to be able to chose, select, and use lots of stuff maybe, I don`t know yet ..
- I want something customizable with templates, but something that can be made stilish of course, as I want to make the e-shop look good aswell.
- I want the e-shop to be very easy to use by my future clients of course, and I want easy communication with my clients, I want them to return and buy more from me , I want them to be happy buying from me... so I want them to be able to comment on the products, rate them, have their accounts on my e-shop so when they return they don`t need to write all their information again and stuff like that, I want them to feel like home, if you can say that ...
- I want lots of payment options of course, like paypal, visa, mastercards, and payment on delivery also. And also billing stuff would be needed. and choices for shipment... things like that...
- Control of the order, I don`t know how to say it in words, but something like the client should be able to see the situation of his order...

there might be more needs than I wrote, but I`m just starting on this one, I`m sure you know better so help!

Now, I`m on the internet for a long time now, and I did try many things as I`m sure many of you did... so simple as it is: I saw Zen-Cart a few years ago, but it didn`t seam very interesting to me... maybe I was wrong back then or maybe it changed ... I heard about osCommerce as being good, but nobody explained me why )... e-Commerce or something like this,don`t know anything about it... "shopify" ??? - what`s that ... and I heard people talking about the virtuemart from joomla...

About the virtuemart I heard many things, like it`s great, it`s easy to use, simple to modify, simple to control and things like that, but nobody talked to me about it`s SEO capabilities... now, this might sound a little bit strange , but I use Joomla on one of my website and I`m not really satisfied . Let me tell you why:
- Of course I made a template for it... so it would look good and everything, now that was not really hard, and it was done properly, you can say it met my expectations...
But, my website loads very hard from what google webmasters tools, or alexa says thing that I don`t like... and it`s not because of the template, and it`s not because of the images from my articles... it`s simply because of the complexity of joomla, lots of css, lots of js and stuff like that...
I wanted to use a forum on this website, and chose to use something that could be integrated with the same DB, so the forum is kind of not good it you can say so...
Profiles and accounts for the members are poor on options and it doesn`t seam that I can do much about it...
Meta data and SEO options, I used some plugin for easing this, but I tried lots, and none seamed to be working fine...

So basically my Joomla website, is not performing as I would like... and it seams google doesn`t seam to like it either )... so I have doubts about the virtuemart because of this.

On the other hand, I used wordpress on some website a long time ago, which seamed to be very simple and very liked by google, and laltey I heard they have some kind of e-shop posibility, but I saw an e-shop made on wordpress and it kind of sucked if I may say so ... I mean it didn`t seam very attractive to me, even though it might have been attractive to google , but as a client let`s say I would not buy from a shop like that )...

So cutting all the long stories and everything, I need a good, simple, search engine optimized, loved by google , stylish, beautiful, client oriented, customizable, eshop ... You know... I want clients to come to my e-shop and think "Wow, I will never buy from somewhere else again! "...

Any suggestions ?

thanks

SNIP

[xcdear213]

I have been using zen cart shopping procedures

[Earthfinds]

I use AscenderCart and have found its SEO features far better than any other shoppping cart I ever used. The support I get from them is great. They actually take the time to explain how things work so I can use the software to my advantage.

I'm afraid of using open source software because I don't know if my clients' credit card information is secure. I know I wouldn't want my credit card information stolen.

[pgmco]

There are many good shopping carts. It depends on many things and really each shop has different needs. CRE Loaded is a good open source platform.

[Saranya11]

In my point of view zen cart is best for this..

[allyson_gss]

I thing magento is the best option. It offers complete flexibility and control over the users experience, content, and functionality of their online store. Its intuitive administration interface features powerful marketing tools, a catalog-management engine and is SEO optimized to give merchants the power to create sites that provide an unrivaled and rich online shopping experience for their customers, tailored to their unique business needs.

[ysb8899]

Zen cart is the best in my idea and experience!

[colinwood07]

Zend cart is best one of e commerce engine from my point of view....

[rashida11]

I recommend Zeuscart which is the best open source ecommerce software solutions.

[Rauny]

I also wanted to know about this. Thanks for sharing.

[cpci]

Zen cart is really good by my information.

[88dbsakthi]

I recommend to use
cs-cart
oscommerce

[Allison2009]

BigCommerce Website would be a huge plus. It is very much user friendly and SEO friendly. It starts with $30 per month. It is very simple to use; yet have powerful features.

[crishlay]

I recommand custom asp.net/php ecommerce development or ready made magento ecommerce development

[brianwaugh90]

Go for Zen cart. It is an excellent option to go for.

[.exe]

busy using wordpress cms its easy opensource and with plugins it can be fine tuned for almost any use

[.exe]

ive designed an ecomerce website with social networking intergrated into it try it see what you can do

[moncorp]

i liked the systems ending with "cart" :-) lolz

[latebloomer]

Tried a whole lot of things. Many carts look good...but clients recognise brands.
Make sure that you show the brand of PayPal.
E-commerce... Magento is good.

[alicecoco]

I am currently using opencart.

[Valentinesmith]

I would recommend you to go ahead and give MAGENTO a try.
As with this E-commerce solution, you can easily implement many SEO practices which are present there by default like:- URL Rewriting, Categories and sub-Categories different MetaTags, Description and Keywords...

I would suggest you to try it on.
Regards.

[surmall]

cs-cart，anyone here know it？

[sherlynjames]

Zend cart is one of best e-commerce engine.

[PaulFlessis]

Catilyndania,

I'm sure impressed by the way you judge anything. But I suggest you to look at it in much more depth before reaching out and deciding for anything or else you'll get your fingers burnt, as you've rightly mentioned about Wordpress+e-Commerce marriage wasn't that impressive - it needed a different pastor to tie the knot (develop it).

Before deciding for e-Commerce, you will have to keep in mind certain procedures and affirmations, like -

• Now, do look for Magento - I've seen the user end perspective, it can really deliver - open source means more open to further development - keep an eye on developers.
• While you work on deciding the software - first thing, have a very solid business plan - make business processes connecting with each other with lots and lots possibilities - choose the best possibility for you to start working on - which also means, you would have to do some soul searching before you move - delve into your passion, research it, study the market and the potential areas where your ideas would fly. You cannot sell your mountain gear to sea divers..!!
• Check the security levels and procedures required for e-Commerce, there are legal requirements your bank and local government might want to see, cross-check your authenticity, which might mean you could be opening or registering for a trade license, check with your local business chapters to help you out with it.

Then, check the security levels measured with Open Source softwares. Do check out Salesforce.com, that is CRM based software, which could help you to classify your LOYAL customers for future retention and promotional selling and communication.

Then comes in your website design concept, content, SEO, Social Media campaign.

Will give more info Social Media in my next reply, only if you find this interesting and you give a thumbs up to this.

Thanks.

Part 2 - coming soon.

[arijith04]

There are lot of web sites providing e-commerce service, dont get confused " Where to buy" make your thoughts makes in realiy and its a shopping search engine, will showcase you the product fron different online shopping sites. Try it once.

[SavingPocket]

As i can see, you want to create a professional e-business. My advice is to talk with a professional web developer and analyze your purpose. Tell him that you just need a professional website to sell products. Then try to find a trustable,reliable company that make search engine optimization.

[Shirley.White]

I have never used magneto will perform a shot now you could give virtuemart a go it is the prefered option of my manager for all our e-commerce websites.

[Chandan_4]

There are many different types of eCommerce software you can use for your online store. Some popular platfoms are Magento, Sopify, BigCommerce, Presta, etc. but i prefer EasyStoreHosting.
I have tried it, and it genuinely works.
EasyStoreHosting offers e-commerce hosting without any extra charge.
EAsyStoreHosting platform is a good choice for any small business that wants to start an online store and maintain an eBay business and is also good if you want to get an online store launched quickly, especially if you lack technical skills.

The most important thing to do is to figure out what you need in an e-commerce system.
Once you figure all that out, now you have something to research. You go and test demos of all the products then decide it.

[seobellawright]

I am using opencart..............

[techbrain]

Go with Magento its best and so many features and plugins are available in it.